3D Television Without Glasses

3d Television without Glasses

The technology behind 3d television has come a long way since the days of the paper glasses we all remember, with one red lens and one blue lens. 3d television has been with us for longer than many people realize, as well- over 80 years! John Logie Baird gave the first public demonstration of stereoscopic 3d TV in 1928, in a London facility. Stereoscopy uses two separate films of the same scene from slightly different angles, which are made to overlap. This gives the composite image the appearance of depth. The methods traditionally used to combine the images range from the prisms in Baird’s old machine, to anaglyph glasses (the red and blue lenses), to the polarized glasses we commonly see today.

More recently, 3d TVs have come with their own LCD shutter glasses, which receive a signal from the TV indicating which eye should see which image to create the stereoscopic effect. TV broadcasts in 3d have used all of the different glasses in the past, on shows from Doctor Who to Discovery Channel’s Shark Week, and several exclusively 3d channels are available to the public. The quality of the illusion presented by any of these methods can be striking, but few people want to wear glasses of any kind while they’re relaxing in front of the TV. To make it appealing to everyone, what’s needed are TVs that allow 3d television without glasses. Luckily, this type of TV is already here!

3d television without glasses utilizes autostereoscopy, which is similar to normal stereoscopy but uses a screen with either lenticular lenses, or a device called a parallax barrier, that can display and combine multiple images at once. This creates viewing zones where the 3d effect can be seen without glasses. Phillips was developing this type of commercially available TV set which would have been available sometime in 2011, but they abandoned the project. Toshiba is currently the frontrunner for 3d television without glasses, with two different LCD sets that use autostereoscopy. However, they are only available in Japan, and the screen sizes leave something to be desired; the models come in 12 inch and 21 inch sizes. They are working on larger screen sizes that will be affordable for the average buyer, and expect to have them available globally by 2015. Other TV manufacturers are also working on glasses-free models, including Samsung, Sony, and LG.

Anyone who has experienced it knows that watching 3d television can be an amazing experience. With all the major companies rushing to liberate us from glasses (and beat each other to the punch, as well), we can all expect to enjoy this exciting new technology very soon!

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